Hughada on the Red Sea, Egypt
Guidebooks advise that this is an ugly place without beaches, expensive accomodation and full of Russians. Bridgend in the summer if you've ever been....Spent 5 nights at a posh resort - included as part of our tour - and only spent 1 night surrounded by Russians in a bar with a barman who did Russian tricks. Managed to win some drinks out of him with some astute mathematics on his cocktail stick problem; received a beer from a thick set Russian who was obviously a sailor or oil oligarth and the ruskis beat Sweden in the football so everyone was happy apart from the blond bearded chaps in the corner wearing viking horns...
Quite liked it really. The taxi drivers weren't aggressive, you could walk past a shop without being bundled in and it didn't smell of camels
Good things
Diving in the Red Sea - seeing fish, not losing buddy (wife), not getting sick, not drowning etc
Snorkelling from the beach
Beach volleyball in Arabic. Had to master the technique of jumping in and out of flip flops at the right time as the sand was still at furnace temperature
Police convoys between Luxor and Hughada and then Hughada to Cairo. A bit like the Canonball Run, hurtling through the desert and getting all the other traffic to stop and wait for you. Not sure why we had an armed guard. Maybe to keep the camel hustlers away?
Leaving dodgy tipping Egypt
Bad thingsWatching football on a screen with a projector that had a permanent smudge in the middle so it was a bit like playing spot the ball
Germany beating the French
Having 2 drivers and a guide in our taxi and having to tip them all
Getting charged extra in Egyptian pounds because none on the banks had enough British pounds. They only trust Euros as the stable foreign currency now it seems.
Guidebooks advise that this is an ugly place without beaches, expensive accomodation and full of Russians. Bridgend in the summer if you've ever been....Spent 5 nights at a posh resort - included as part of our tour - and only spent 1 night surrounded by Russians in a bar with a barman who did Russian tricks. Managed to win some drinks out of him with some astute mathematics on his cocktail stick problem; received a beer from a thick set Russian who was obviously a sailor or oil oligarth and the ruskis beat Sweden in the football so everyone was happy apart from the blond bearded chaps in the corner wearing viking horns...
Quite liked it really. The taxi drivers weren't aggressive, you could walk past a shop without being bundled in and it didn't smell of camels
Good things
Diving in the Red Sea - seeing fish, not losing buddy (wife), not getting sick, not drowning etc
Snorkelling from the beach
Beach volleyball in Arabic. Had to master the technique of jumping in and out of flip flops at the right time as the sand was still at furnace temperature
Police convoys between Luxor and Hughada and then Hughada to Cairo. A bit like the Canonball Run, hurtling through the desert and getting all the other traffic to stop and wait for you. Not sure why we had an armed guard. Maybe to keep the camel hustlers away?
Leaving dodgy tipping Egypt
Bad thingsWatching football on a screen with a projector that had a permanent smudge in the middle so it was a bit like playing spot the ball
Germany beating the French
Having 2 drivers and a guide in our taxi and having to tip them all
Getting charged extra in Egyptian pounds because none on the banks had enough British pounds. They only trust Euros as the stable foreign currency now it seems.
